Invasion of Normandy

The Invasion of Normandy was the invasion by and establishment of Western Allied forces in Normandy, during Operation Overlord in 1944 during World War II; the largest amphibious invasion to ever take place.

D-Day, the day of the initial assaults, was Tuesday 6 June 1944. Allied land forces that saw combat in Normandy on that day came from Canada, the Free French forces, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In the weeks following the invasion, Polish forces also participated, as well as contingents from Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, and the Netherlands. Most of the above countries also provided air and naval support, as did the Royal Australian Air Force, the Royal New Zealand Air Force, and the Royal Norwegian Navy.

The Normandy invasion began with overnight parachute and glider landings, massive air attacks and naval bombardments. In the early morning, amphibious landings on five beaches codenamed Juno, Gold, Omaha, Utah, and Sword began and during the evening the remaining elements of the parachute divisions landed. Land forces used on D-Day deployed from bases along the south coast of England, the most important of these being Portsmouth.

D-day assault map of Normandy and northwest coastal France.

Cotentin Peninsula (Cherbourg peninsula) in Normandy.

One of the three Stabskompanie Panzer VI Tigers of s.SS-Pz.Abt.102 moves through a small French village in Normandy, July 1944.

Panzer Lehr Division at Juaye Mondaye in Normandy (8km. south of Bayeux).

SS-Untersturmführer Franz-Josef Kneipp playing guitar with his comrade. He was signal officer in the III./SS-Panzergrenadier Rgt. 25. He was severely wounded on July 8, 1944 near Buron while standing in the turret of a tank and captured by Canadian troops.

A Grenadier from 12. SS-Panzer-Division “Hitlerjugend” lit a cigarette during a pause in the battle. The picture was taken in Normandy front (France) in June 1944 by SS-Kriegsberichter Wilfried Woscidlo.

German infantrymen scan the skies for Allied aircraft in Normandy, (after the invasion) June 1944.

German troops, accepting a drink from a French villager somewhere in Normandy.

Sainte-Mère-Église, Lower Normandy. 8th June 1944.

A group of veteran prisoners captured at Maltot, south west of Caen, Normandy.

German POWs being escorted along one of the Gold area beaches, Normandy. 6 June 1944.

Normandy July 1944.

7th of June 1944.

An abandoned German machine gun, France, June 1944

Knocked out Panther pushed to the side of the road somewhere in Normandy.

The sad remains of a Messerschmitt Bf 110 G-4 “3G+DR” of 7.Staffel/NJG 4. The photograph was taken in the summer of 1945 at Reims in France after the Battle of Normandy.

Tiger 331 Northern France 1944.

The Tiger I’s armour reached up to 120 mm on the mantlet. This tank is assigned to the schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101 operating in northern France in 1944.

Field Marshal von Kluge on the Western front

Max Wünsche(left), Fritz Witt(center), Kurt Meyer(right) at a commanders strategy session on or about 7–14 June 1944 in the vicinity of Caen, France.

A Sd.Kfz. 250/5 leading a column of four 15 cm Panzerwerfer 42 in June, 1944.

Panzerwerfer crew prepares to launch battery.

A close-up of the Sd.Kfz. 250/5 and the first 15 cm Panzerwerfer 42 in June, 1944.

MG-34 at the firing position during operation Allied Normandy (Operation ‘Overlord’).

Battle of Saint-Lô

The Battle of Saint-Lô is one of the three conflicts in the Battle of the Hedgerows, which took place between July 9–24, 1944, just before Operation Cobra. Saint-Lô had fallen to Germany in 1940, and, after the Invasion of Normandy, the Americans targeted the city, as it served as a strategic crossroads. American bombardments caused heavy damage (up to 95% of the city was destroyed) and a high number of casualties, which resulted in the martyr city being called “The Capital of Ruins”, popularized in a report by Samuel Beckett.

Three senior German commanders in the Battle against Allied troops in St.-Lô area, Normandy, 16 July 1944. From left to right: General der Fallschirmtruppe Eugen Meindl (Kommandierender General II. Fallschirmkorps), SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Paul Hausser (Oberbefehlshaber 7. Armee), and Generalleutnant Dipl.Ing. Richard Schimpf (Kommandeur 3. Fallschirmjäger-Division). Behind Schimpf is SS-Hauptsturmführer Karl-Heinz Boska (Adjutant Oberbefehlshaber 7. Armee). In this meeting Meindl told his commander, Hausser, that the German defense position at St.-Lô was untenable any longer due to the superiority of the Allied forces on land and in the air.

Saint-Lô Train Station ruins.

Saint-Lô after U.S. bombing, July 1944.

Saint-Lô, 95% destroyed after the 1944 bombardments, known as The Capital of Ruins.

The old prison gate.

Front lines shortly before the battle.

Operation Cobra

Operation Cobra was the codename for an offensive launched by the First United States Army seven weeks after the D-Day landings, during the Normandy Campaign of World War II. American Lieutenant General Omar Bradley’s intention was to take advantage of the German preoccupation with British and Canadian activity around the town of Caen, in Operation Goodwood, and immediately punch through the German defenses that were penning in his troops while the Germans were distracted and unbalanced. Once a corridor had been created, the First Army would then be able to advance into Brittany, rolling up the German flanks and releasing itself of the constraints imposed by operating in the Norman bocage countryside. After a slow start the offensive gathered momentum, and German resistance collapsed as scattered remnants of broken units fought to escape to the Seine. Lacking the resources to cope with the situation, the German response was ineffectual, and the entire Normandy front soon collapsed. Operation Cobra, together with concurrent offensives by the Second British and First Canadian Armies, was decisive in securing an Allied victory in the Normandy Campaign.

Having been delayed several times by poor weather, Operation Cobra commenced on 25 July with a concentrated aerial bombardment from thousands of Allied aircraft. Supporting offensives had drawn the bulk of German armored reserves toward the British and Canadian sector, and coupled with the general lack of men and materiel available to the Germans, it was impossible for them to form successive lines of defense. Units of VII Corps led the initial two-division assault, while other First Army corps mounted supporting attacks designed to pin German units in place. Progress was slow on the first day, but opposition started to crumble once the defensive crust had been broken. By 27 July, most organized resistance had been overcome, and VII and VIII Corps were advancing rapidly, isolating the Cotentin peninsula.

By 31 July, XIX Corps had destroyed the last forces opposing the First Army, and Bradley’s troops were finally freed from the bocage. Reinforcements were moved west by Field Marshal Günther von Kluge and employed in various counterattacks, the largest of which (codenamed Operation Lüttich) was launched on 7 August between Mortain and Avranches. Although this led to the bloodiest phase of the battle, it was mounted by already exhausted and understrength units, and had little effect other than to further deplete von Kluge’s forces. On 8 August, troops of the newly activated Third United States Army captured the city of Le Mans, formerly the German Seventh Army’s headquarters. Operation Cobra transformed the high-intensity infantry combat of Normandy into rapid maneuver warfare, and led to the creation of the Falaise pocket and the loss of the German position in northwestern France.

D-Day, Normandy, and the Falaise Pocket.

Lower Normandy, France.

Soldat of the 2.SS-Panzer-Division ‘Das Reich’ being searched by a US soldier after surrender.

Saint-Lô, Normandy, summer 1944.

Tiger 1 in Normandy 1944.

Tiger I tanks of the I SS Panzer Corps Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler close to Villers-Bocage. June 1944.

Tiger I “(tower number 133) of the first SS-Panzer-Korps “Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler” in town before business “Nieuverburg” in the foreground floating bucket, PK 698 during the Normandy invasion.

Jagdpanther in Northern France.

12th SS PzDiv at the invasion front.

12th SS PzDiv at the invasion front.

12th SS PzDiv at the invasion front.

German soldiers surrendering in St. Lambert on 19 August 1944.

German prisoners from SS-Panzerdivision Hitlerjugend during Normady.

Tiger 2 at Normandy.

Tiger 2 at Normandy.

75mm Inf Gun, France June 21st 1944.

A German Waffen SS Hitlerjugend soldier involved in heavy fighting in and around the French town of Caen in mid-1944. He is carrying an MG 42 configured as a light support weapon with a folding bipod and detachable 50-round belt drum container.

Other Parts of France after the Invasion of Normandy

StuG III in France.

Post-D-Day destruction, northern France, 1944.

Ruins, northwestern France, summer 1944, after D-Day.

Ruined building and sign in French and German, northwestern France, summer 1944.

Destroyed town in northwest France, summer 1944.

Möbelwagen in northern France, June 21, 1944.

88 with crew, France, 1944.

Leftovers from a British column.

Negotiations on a prisoner exchange of a 55-man combat patrol from the US 94th Infantry Division was captured by the Germans near Lorient, France in the Fall of 1944.

Negotiations on a prisoner exchange of a 55-man combat patrol from the US 94th Infantry Division was captured by the Germans near Lorient, France in the Fall of 1944.

Sturmbannfuhrer Rolf Schulz, M.D.

Abandoned Tiger, Marle, France late 1944.

Dead soldiers sprawled on a panzer in northwest Europe, circa 1944

American soldiers playing cards in front of a destroyed Flakpanzer 38(t) in Normandy, 1944.

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